Saturday, July 30, 2016

One afternoon in the
spring of 2001, as I was preparing to leave Furman University to accept a call
to the pastorate of the First Baptist Church of Greenville, South Carolina, I ran
into Dr. Bill Brantley, a physics professor and friend, who engaged me in a
conversation about the university and the church, the virtues and flaws of
each, about what a calling is, and about why anyone in his or her right mind would
leave the security and comfort of a tenured faculty position for the insecurities
and inescapable expectations of pastoring a tall-steeple church. As our
conversation ended, Bill pointed a finger at me and landed a parting shot before
he turned to walk away: “Put your hand to the plow and don’t look back,” he said.
His paraphrase of the words of Jesus in Luke 9:62 took me by surprise and made
my impending departure from the college campus that had been my home away from
home for thirteen years suddenly more real than anything else yet had. “Put
your hand to the plow and don’t look back.”

Now, before I go any
farther, let make it very clear that the Office of Alumni Relations wants you
to look back and come back. And the Office of University Advancement wants you
to look back and give back. And so do I. But Jesus’ words in Luke 9:62 are a
first-century equivalent of the latter-century admonition to every student in
Driver’s Education: “Keep your eyes on the road.” And this morning, those words
serve as a reminder to the graduates and to us all that we are doomed to crash if
we insist on driving by our rearview mirror. So on this occasion of
Commencement, beginning, outset and setting out, I want to offer you a word of
orientation and a word of encouragement.

First, the word of
orientation. Jesus addressed the words, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and
looks back is fit for the kingdom of God,” to someone who expressed a simple desire
to say good-bye to family and friends. If it weren’t Jesus who said it, most of
us would consider this remonstrance to be inconsiderate, insensitive, even. If
you think about the family and social dynamics at play in the famous sequence
of sayings of Jesus in Luke 9—“the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head”; “let
the dead bury the dead”; and put your hand to the plow and don’t look back, as
Bill Brantley paraphrased it—you will understand why many Jews and Greeks and
Romans alike were offended by the teachings of Jesus and by the earliest
Christian communities because they understood them to be contrary to family
values and destructive to the fabric of ordered society. Sara Evans sang it in a
country song titled “Suds in the Bucket”: “How can eighteen years just up and
walk away . . . gone in the blink of an eye?” That’s exactly what Jesus said to
do in Luke 9:62. That sudden departure without so much as a good-bye violates
our family values and our assumptions about the nature of ordered society. Some
of us know that violated feeling at home or work or church: We have experienced
a departure that left us with a hole in our heart, unanswered questions in our
mind, and an empty cavern in our soul. So here’s a word of orientation to those
of us who are leaving and to those who are being left: Face Forward. “Put your
hand to the plow and don’t look back.” The essence of a biblically grounded
faith is not in how tenaciously we cling to the things of the past but in how
expectantly we embrace God’s future for us and for the world: Facing forward, eyes
on the road ahead, not longing for the sights and sounds of the past but
embracing vistas of a future yet to unfold. Face forward. That’s the word of
orientation.

Now for the word of
encouragement. The underlying testimony of Scripture from Genesis to Revelation
and the explicit witness of Psalm 139 is that there is no time or place, no
circumstance or situation, outside the reach or beyond the real and effective
presence of God. According to Psalm 139, no matter where you go or when you go
there, you cannot escape the presence of God. You cannot run fast enough or far
enough to arrive a place that God cannot reach you, a place where the effective
presence of God does not surround you and hold you fast, even when you are not
aware of it or even when you actively assert God’s absence.

Six years ago now, John
M. Buchanan, who was then the Pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago and
the editor and publisher of The Christian
Century,recounted this
remarkable description of the reach of the real and effective presence of God: “a
minister I know had to lead her suburban Chicago congregation through an
unspeakable tragedy: a member of the congregation shot and killed his wife and
her son and then killed himself. The minister had to comfort her congregation and
hold it together. She spoke at a memorial service for the mother and son. What
is there to say in that situation? She told the congregation crowded into the
sanctuary that there was a phrase in the Apostles’ Creed that had always
bothered her: the phrase stating that Jesus ‘descended into hell.’ She told how
the pastor of the church in which she grew up so disliked that line he went
through the hymnals with a large black Magic Marker and crossed it out. ‘I grew
up saying the creed without that line,’ the minister said. ‘Now, this week,’
she said, ‘I understand it. We have descended into hell together and Christ has
gone before us, into every corner of it. The good news is that when life takes
us there, when we have to go there, [Christ] goes with us,’” she said. (The Christian Century, March 23, 2010,
p. 3).

The testimony of Scripture and the witness
of the most ancient confessions of the Christian faith agree that there is no
time or place, no circumstance or situation, outside the reach or beyond the
real and effective presence of God. Songwriters Sam Tate, Annie Tate, and Dave
Berg combined a quote from Winston Churchill—“If you’re going through Hell,”
Churchill said, “keep going”—and an Irish toast—“May you be in Heaven five
minutes before the devil knows you’re dead”—to come up with an infectiously
singable chorus that Rodney Atkins took to the top of the country music charts:
“If you’re goin’ through hell, keep on going. Don’t slow down. If you’re
scared, don’t show it. You might get out before the devil even knows you’re
there.” You might. Or you might not. But the Ultimate difference maker is not chance
or the ignorance of the devil. The Ultimate difference maker is that when life
takes us into hell, Christ has already gone before us into every corner of it; and
when we have to go there, Christ goes with us. The essence of facing forward is
not hoping that we will avoid or escape failure or fear, pain or suffering, grief
or death or even hell for that matter. The essence of facing forward is the
full confidence and trust that come whatever may, there is no time or place, no
circumstance or situation, outside the reach or beyond the real and effective presence
of God. That’s the word of encouragement.

So with Alumni Relations, I say, “Come
back . . . any time.” And with University Advancement, I say, “Give back . . . all
the time.” And with Jesus I say, face forward: Put your hand to the plow and
don’t look back.

1 comment:

Reading this I'm reminded why I miss so much hearing Jeff Rogers preach. Fortunately for me, when the Potter was throwing preachers for our time, She must have made Rogers and our parish priest, Augusta Anne Anderson from the same batch of clay. Obviously, they get their stuff from the same Spirit.

About Me

has enjoyed a thirty-year career in higher education and ministry. He currently serves as Associate Provost for Digital Learning and Dean of the Gayle Bolt Price School of Graduate Studies at Gardner-Webb University in Boiling Springs, NC.
An author or editor of six books and dozens of articles in refereed journals and standard reference works, he is a former president of the South Carolina Academy of Religion and has been a pastor, interim pastor, guest preacher and teacher in Baptist, Christian (Disciples), Episcopal, Lutheran, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches in GA, NJ, NY, NC, PA, SC, and Canada.
He has taught at Furman University in Greenville, SC, where he also served as Assistant and Associate Academic Dean; in the Degree Completion and M.A. in Religion programs at Gardner-Webb; and at Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Columbia, SC. In addition, he has been a Field Education Supervisor for M.Div. students from Duke Divinity School in Durham, NC, and Erskine Theological Seminary in Due West, SC.
He is a husband of 39 years and a father of four sons ranging in age from 27 to 8 years of age.

Published by Abingdon Press in 2008 and now available for Kindle from amazon.com (click above for details).

What They're Saying about Building a House:

"Rogers' multiple gifts as an insightful biblical scholar and a thoughtful, pragmatic pastor creatively intertwine as he artfully connects different biblical responses to diversity with the challenges facing church leaders every day. . . . a wise, honest, and indispensible resource that should be at the top of the required reading list for clergy and church leaders."Charles Kimball, DirectorReligious Studies ProgramUniversity of Oklahoma, Norman, OK

"This is a 'must read' for anyone who cares about the Christian mission in the twenty-first century."Daniel Vestal, Executive Coordinator (Retired) Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Atlanta, GA

"This is a book worthy of reading because the world religious community has moved into our neighborhood and stands at our doors."Jerry Bradley, PresidentChildren At Heart Ministries, Round Rock, TX

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The Jeanne Lenhardt Bridge

Crosses the Reedy River and connects First Baptist Greenville and the historic Nicholtown community on the Swamp Rabbit Trail, dedicated June 6, 2009. Thanks to Jeanne and thanks be to God! (Click the pic to read more about it!)